Ten years had gone by since the Durango Demons boys basketball had won a league championship. After Saturday’s game at Grand Junction, that drought ended.
The Demons led from the start and held off a late Tigers comeback to win their regular-season finale 55-51 at Grand Junction. The win improved the Demons’ stellar overall record to 20-3 on the season.
Durango needed to win Saturday to clinch the title. A loss would’ve handed it to Grand Junction Central, who beat Grand Junction on Friday night to end the Tigers’ hopes of a fifth consecutive league crown. Durango and Central both ended with 6-2 league records and split their regular-season head-to-head meetings, but Durango’s sweep of Grand Junction provided the tiebreaker. Central went 1-1 against its crosstown rival this season.
DHS senior Steven Wyman was even more dominant usual, as he racked up a double-double of 20 points and 13 rebounds to help lead the team to its first league title since the 2006-2007.
“It’s the best feeling in the world to bring a league title back to Durango,” Wyman said. “We came together as a family as the season went on and, I don’t know if I expected us to be this good, but that’s what happens when you have a group that believs in each other and stands up for each other on and off the court.”
The win is also head coach Alan Batiste’s first in his three years as the boys head coach at Durango High School.
“When (assistant coach Dalon Parker) and I wrote down the names of this group on a sheet, we felt like we had a brand new team,” Batiste said. “When we saw them scrimmage, we could see that we might have something pretty special on our hands. Ever since then, they’ve been getting better and better. It’s a fun team and a close team. Everyone contributes, and that’s why they’ve been so successful as a unit.”
Saturday was symbolic of the way the Demons (20-3, 6-2 5A/4A Southwestern League) have stormed through their schedule with only three losses. Wyman led the charge while Kyle Kirkpatrick nailed big shots and finished with 11 points.
The real difference-maker, as it has been all season, was finding enough contributions from the rest of the squad to help the two stars. Zach Geauthreaux, who doesn’t light up the stat sheet on a nightly basis but makes a huge difference on defense, drilled two big 3-pointers, grabbed five rebounds and dished out a pair of assists in Saturday’s win. Javier Quezada, who has provided a huge lift for Durango in recent weeks, did so again at Grand Junction with nine points, including a pair of 3s when the game was tightening up that helped pad the Demons’ cushion. Malik Liggins added seven key points to pitch in as well.
“I knew when we started this season that this group was going to do something big,” Kirkpatrick said. “Javy (Quezada) has been big in the last few weeks, but it’s a different guy every night helping out. Malik has been huge, Kobe (Szura) brings so much to the table that doesn’t show up in the book. We’re just a great all-around team.”
Durango led by five after the first quarter and six at halftime. The Tigers cut the DHS lead to two early in the third quarter, but Durango rattled off a 7-0 run that bumped the lead up to nine.
The Tigers (12-10, 5-3 SWL) clawed their way back into the game late, but Wyman and company buried enough free throws to put an end to the comeback and put a cap on the league title.
“We were just exhausted and ecstatic when the buzzer sounded,” Kirkpatrick said. “We had three games in four nights to win this thing it felt like the odds were stacked against us. We knew that if we just left it all out there, it would go our way, and that’s what happened.”
Durango has a week to recover before hosting a second-round game in the Colorado High School Activities Association Class 4A state tournament on Saturday. The first round of the tournament begins Wednesday.
jfries@durangoherald.com
